Sunday Post with Berls | Week of April 10th 2022

Week of April 10th 2022

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kim @ Caffeinated Reviewer. It’s a chance to share news~ A post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received. Share news about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead.

News at Home

Sunday

Sunday was SUPER busy, as anticipated. I got up early-ish, got breakfast together for Dante and Kiko, ran and picked up groceries, came home and meal prepped. Oh, and somewhere in there I did 3 loads of laundry (without putting them away). I grabbed a shower and got ready – then we were off to my brother-in-law’s house, where Kiko’s mom was staying. We were there for 2-3 hours and then my MIL came home with us. When I got home so much still to do – I had 3 loads of laundry to put away, Dante to move to our bedroom, setting up his room for her to use with the blow-up twin, a few things for work, and cleaning bathrooms. I managed to still get in Dante’s table time and he’s continuing to do great. I’m getting to bed mostly on time, not sure how it’s going to be with Dante sleeping in our room. He went to sleep just fine in his bed when we lay him down, so we’ll see.

Monday

Well, I didn’t sleep well at all! First of all, Dante makes a lot of noise when he sleeps. Nothing bad, just not the noises I hear from the other room. He slept wonderful on the other hand. I actually had to wake him up to go to school because he was OUT. At least one of us slept well! (Kiko also didn’t sleep well he said). Hoping tonight goes better, that we’re more used to having him in there.

Work was SUPER busy today. We had a wedding shower and since I’m 1/3 of the Sunshine Committee that took up all my time. It was a smashing success though and I really love doing it. After that I went to see my brother and Zach for a bit and then I had some errands with MIL staying over – needed to stop at the store for a few items for her and then I also picked up Church’s Chicken for dinner because apparently, it’s her favorite.

This evening we had dinner then I sat on the balcony working on some bootcamp with Dante. Then we did table time – and he apparently knows how to match colors now. I was trying to get him to talk… but hey! cool side effect. Getting ready to wrap up for the evening and politely kick my MIL out of the kitchen where she is cleaning so that I can take over… maybe? LOL

Tuesday

Today was a good day, for sure. I slept great – I think I had a lot of anxiety about the impact sleeping in our room would have on Dante’s sleep and in reality it only impacted my sleep! So I went to bed on schedule last night and slept really well, without tossing and turning all night. This morning’s routine went great and I had Dante to school by about 8:10/8:15. When I came home my MIL was awake and happily making herself breakfast. She spent the day watching TV, sitting on the balcony and talking to Buffy lol. A few times she stopped and talked to me – which led to our difficult Spanish conversations. Basically she was telling me I work to much and to take a break. Tell me something I don’t know ;). Work was pretty busy today – we just (as of the 10th) transitioned the entire system (so like 18K employees) to a new timekeeping system. As you can imagine, it’s had some bumps. As a timekeeper, as well as what they call a Super User, this has meant more meetings and general work for me. I had planned to spend about 1 hour on it today. I ended up spending something like 5 or 6 because of unexpected complications. I was in one meeting for Super Users and Time Keepers that lasted 2.5 hours! And while I was multi tasking during that meeting, I really had to pay attention because a lot of things they were going over applied to my department and were things I had to fix.

I had therapy at 1:30 today and decided to use it as a chance to get away from my desk and the stress for a walk. It was a good session and she helped me to realize that although I’ve shed plenty of tears, I’m still fighting my emotions about Dante’s probable Autism and haven’t truly grieved. And I think she’s right – I’m in fight mode, which isn’t bad since he does need my help, but I need to move into acceptance. I’ve moved through denial and anger for sure, but I still have moments where I’m struck with incredible sadness. She thinks I’m in the bargaining phase, where if I just work with Dante every day and get him loads of ABA therapy somehow it won’t be true that he’s Autistic. So yeah, I can see how I haven’t truly grieved. Something I will keep working on.

In the meantime, I am still working with Dante every night and seeing great progress. Tonight, we did puzzles, and he pointed (he never points, it’s one of our goals for table time) to the spots where each piece was supposed to go to earn the piece. And I discovered he’s a wiz at puzzles. I gave him one he’s never seen before, and he matched it up so fast! Also, while I was doing table time, my MIL cleaned the kitchen. My husband was upset that she’s cleaning but honestly, I both understand wanting to help out as a guest and also super appreciate the help.

Wednesday

I slept pretty well again last night, though Dante was noisy enough to wake me a few times again. And he slept in! I had to wake him up around 8:30 because I have meetings that start at 9 so I have to get him to daycare before then. My MIL was with us until about 1 today and then my SILs came and picked her up – I was in the middle of a meeting, so I was unable to do more than wave to say goodbye. But when I went into Dante’s room later to clean up and get ready to move him back to his room, I discovered she’d left a bunch of her stuff. Turns out she’s coming back on Saturday. She likes staying here I guess. I’m calling that a win… even if it does mean Dante’s back in our room on Saturday.

Work continues to be busy, but not too busy. I was able to still get my bootcamp work that I needed done and get in a nice walk this afternoon. And Dante is increasingly vocal – so many almost words today (not even at table time, just in general). Makes me really hopeful that it’s proving effective! His therapist and I did exchange some texts today in preparation for her session with him tomorrow. She mentioned that as she’s working with him at school she’s seeing more signs that makes her think he could be on the spectrum – and she said that without my having said anything. So more confirmation. But I told her after that about my concerns, his appointment May 10 with the developmental pediatrician, and for some info about ABA therapy. She said we’re clearly on top of it and she feels really positive about what that means for Dante. So I’m hopeful. Oh and he ate his fruit pouch from a bowl today – wrong packaging! Hoping that keeps working!!

Now I need to clean my kitchen since MIL isn’t here! LOL and then to bed.

Thursday

A very good, but busy day. I slept the best I have all week with Dante in his own room. I don’t know how some people sleep with their kids IN THEIR BEDS for years! Dante’s been in his own room since he was like 3 or 4 months. I was a little unfocused in the morning and didn’t do my normal morning routine for office days. But we still got out of the house on time and I got to work in time. Work was busy-ish. It’s gotten I rarely have much time for anything but work during work hours. Which is fine – that’s how it should be and honestly feels better than having oodles of free time. That said, it does make getting the extras (like my coding bootcamp) work done. I rushed out at 3 today so that I could get to Dante’s daycare in time for his first Easter Egg Hunt. I walked it at 3:40 and they were lined up at the door ready to go outside, so I JUST made it. I am really glad I went, since they had tried to practice with the kids in the classroom but Dante’s teacher said he just took the egg and threw it – he didn’t get it. But I helped him with the first couple eggs, cheering him on and he got it. He just needs really 1:1 attention and instruction for these things. I got a short video and a picture, if you want to see on Instagram.

After his egg hunt, I snuck out hoping that the snacks they were going to have afterwards would keep him from being too upset – I brought cookies I knew he would love for the class – since I still had bootcamp work to do. I went home and finished up the bootcamp work I had just in time to go back and pick him up – and my plan had worked, he was upset for a minute but then he got his snacks and cheered right up! At home we did dinner and watched a little TV (starting the most recent season of Yellowstone finally). Then it was table time (he runs so happily to the table, so glad) and he is definitely getting better at pointing! Also, we’re just noticing so much more vocalization in general throughout the day. Really hoping I’ll see some manding or echoing soon!

After cleaning up and getting Dante to bed I really felt like I just hadn’t had enough movement for the day; squeezing in the egg hunt meant cutting out some of my time. Since I don’t have to work tomorrow and can sleep in a bit, I went ahead and did a workout. I have this Dance workout membership called Social Joy that I just love – it’s cheap, my own schedule (with 2-3 new workouts a week) and the instructor/playlists/dance moves just make me smile. I had a great 45-minute workout, followed by a shower. Now I’m getting ready to head to bed!

Friday

I slept in until about 8/8:30 this morning – waking up just minutes before Dante. After making pancake breakfast for Dante and Kiko, I got to work on some coding for bootcamp. I figured out how to pull my API which was a real victory, since it was something I’ve been struggling with since the last section. Then I took Dante for our long walk to the park and we played there a bit. He has gotten really attached to the swings though – which is a problem for me for a couple reasons. (1) we have a swing he can use at home; (2) the point of the park is for him to run around and play, not sit and be pushed, after a long walk in his stroller where he sits as well; and (3) other kids want to use the swing. Today  he was in the swing for almost 10 minutes and I could tell this other kid wanted to go on, so I had Dante get off. He went down 1 slide and after that, he saw the other kid in the swing and just lay down in the wood chips crying. I decided MAYBE he was extra tired and it seemed accurate since he fell asleep on the way back to the car.

This evening we did table time again and he’s started making more sounds and is pointing super well. I feel like we’re making good progress! I stayed up a little later than I planned again tonight  though and I have bootcamp workshop class tomorrow; hope I get enough sleep.

Saturday

I woke up around 8:15 this morning and Dante woke up just minutes after again… I’m starting to think that the morning this happens I hear him stirring and it wakes me up LOL. I got his oatmeal and Kiko’s pancakes and then ran in for my workshop session. Today’s session was a lot of work, a lot of debugging, but ultimately really successful thanks to a good instructor. Last night when doing budget I had looked up our car insurance to see what and when we’d be paying, since it was set to auto-renew start of the month. And I couldn’t find anything on the website – not our new cards, not the payment schedule, nothing. Thankfully they’re open today, so I called as soon as bootcamp was over and discovered that in a series of fuck ups on their part, we were not auto renewed. And even though they honored our renewal price, we had to go through the agency for the renewal, we couldn’t do it with them directly. Which meant I had to pay an unexpected $431 and I couldn’t afford not to since we have been unknowingly without car insurance since April 2nd. That hurt and the next two weeks are going to be super tight. Plus the rate went up almost $50/month. Which I guess is happening everywhere – inflation is a bitch!

Anyway, after I got that all sorted out my friend Stacey came over – we had made plans about 1 month ago. Every time we get together we schedule our next get together, otherwise we’ll both get too busy and it won’t happen. We hung out a bit and then took Dante on the same walk to the park. Well my concern from yesterday was founded, he wanted to do the swing and NOTHING else. He even refused to go on the slide. So that was the last time (for a while) that we’re going to that park. I did some searching and I think I found another park, also in walking distance, but without any swings. I’m going to try and drive by it tomorrow and as long as it’s good we’ll make that our new destination next week.

This evening my MIL came back and she’s staying with us again until Tuesday/Wednesday. I took Monday off and I’m glad I did because tomorrow for Easter we’ll be busy. BUT I don’t feel like I will be able to relax as well with her here. I mean I’ll need to be doing laundry and meal prep anyway, so not like I could really relax a whole lot. But still, I was looking forward to a day home alone.

Blog News

Last week on Because Reading

• [11 Apr] Dick Fight Island, Vol. 1 by Reibun Ike ★★★★
• [12 Apr] Tell Me Something Tuesday: TBR the longest
• [13 Apr] Waiting on Wednesday ~ Frankenstein is that you? #booklovers #wow
• [14 Apr] Wild by Sophie Jordan ★★★★½
• [17 Apr] Sunday Post with Berls | Week of April 10th 2022
• [17 Apr] The Sunday Post ~ Easter ~ Week in READview! 2021

Challenge update

This week I finished:

I’m participating in 7 Challenges, plus the Goodreads Challenge, this year. Here’s how I’m doing.

1. COYER Seasons & COYER Community 2022 –
   1. Winter – 22 books (final count for Winter)
   2. Spring – 10 books
2. Bookish Resolutions – This was a challenge that Michelle used to do without me and she took last year off. This year we’re bringing it back together. Details on post, but basically I’m setting 5 “bookish” goals for the year: Here are my goals:
   1. Blog ahead at least 1 week. Yes! I’ve done this all year so far!
   2. Keep a blogging planner. I’ve done well with this since last month, when I changed my methods.
   3. Visit & comment on 7 posts a week. Yes! I didn’t visit every day but I did visit several days (more than 7 posts for sure)
   4. Reply to comments each week. No 🙁 sorry y’all I’m trying!
   5. Review books before starting a new book/on the same day – Um no. I have 3 books to write reviews for this weekend. Whoops!
3. The Backlist Reader Challenge –  17/50 books
4. 2022 Audiobook Challenge –  33/75 books
5. 2022 Library Love Challenge –  11/24 books
6. 2022 Finishing the Series Challenge – My goal is 5 series.
   • In Progress:
     1. Mine by Cynthia Eden- read book 4 this year, still need to read 5 and 6.
     2. Amos Decker by David Bald Baldacci – read book 2 this year, still need to read 4-6 (#7 expected later this year)
   • Completed:
     1. The Ivy Chronicles by Sophie Jordan – read books 2 and 3 this year, finishing the series.

FitReaders (hosted by Jen @ That’s What I’m Talking About & Felicia The Geeky Blogger)

My big goal for 2022 is to lose weight every month. I’m not setting a specific number goal; I just need to make sure I’m going the right direction (down) every month. I will weigh in on the last (or first) day of each month only (so I don’t get too attached to the scale).

This week was all over the place health wise. I ate candy – LOTS of it thanks to Easter and the wedding shower. But thanks to meal prep I also ate fairly decent meals. I’m calling it mostly a wash.

Weight gain/loss for the year so far:

• +3.9 pounds Feb 1.
• -3.0 pounds March 1 (for the year, so total loss for Feb was 6.9 lbs!)
• -3.0  pounds April 1 (for the year, so no new loss in March, but no gain)

Added to My Shelf

I’m trying to be more responsible about keeping track of the books I acquire, so I’m going to start sharing them again. If I share them here, surely I’ll remember to add them to Goodreads, right?

How was your week? What are you Reading?

Related Posts